Groceteria.com

Was there ever an expansion of California's Ralphs stores to the East Coast? I found a 1983 ad from the New York Times while looking for Memco information from a liquidating company that was selling fixtures. They mention that they had closed out "5 Ralph's Supermarkets" (with an apostrophe) and their warehouse was in East Hanover, NJ.

My guess is that there is no relation but I figured I would ask. I realize that Ralph is a common name and there's a Ralph's (with an apostrophe) in David's Greensboro section. Also, the ad calls it Ralph's with an apostrophe when the California version has no apostrophe as the founder's name was George A. Ralphs.

I have no knowlege of a Ralphs east coast operation. The Greensboro one definitely had an apostrophe and was a one-off owned by a local guy whose first name was Ralph.

My guess is that the ad was for someone like Grafe Auctions, who liquidates fixtures nationwide (and whose site is an interesting photo source from time to time).

The ad was from Bland/Wiggs, "America's largest buyer/seller of used fixtures." The other stores they had stuff from was Two Guys, Kings Stores, "Target/Fedmart", and Memco.

I figured the Greensboro Ralph's (with an apostrophe) was a local operation. I didn't mean to imply that there was a connection to the California Ralphs.

BTW, the message board keeps editing out the apostrophe when I try to write Ralph(apostrophe)s.